Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin were in Doha, Qatar, for joint meetings with the Qatari counterparts, Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Qatari Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Dr. Khalid bin Mohammed Al Attiyah. The number one item on their agenda, though not the only one, was Afghanistan. Blinken and Austin effusively praised the government of Qatar for its support of the U.S. evacuation of Americans and at-risk Afghans from Kabul in August. Of the 124,000 people evacuated in total, 58,000 of them passed through Qatar. Qatar also played an important diplomatic role in enabling U.S. diplomacy with the Taliban, and the U.S. expects that to continue.
“It’s not a coincidence that we’ve transferred our Afghanistan diplomatic operations to Doha,” Blinken said. “As we carry forward our diplomacy here, we know that Qatar will be our partner, because this is not the first time that Qatar has stepped up to help in Afghanistan. For years, at our request, you facilitated diplomacy between the Taliban and the Afghan Government to try to bring the conflict to a peaceful resolution.”
